Polish MEPs leave ECR group

Four Polish MEPs have defected from the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group in the European Parliament to join the Europe of Freedom and Democracy (EFD) group.

Zbigniew Ziobro, Tadeusz Cymański, Jacek Kurski and Jacek Wlosowicz said they were increasingly uncomfortable with the ECR’s liberal position on gay marriage, support for the EU’s climate-change policies and limiting EU spending on agriculture. The MEPs want to make sure Poland gets more money from the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP).

The MEPs had formed a splinter group, called United Poland, within the ECR after they were expelled from the conservative Law and Justice party (PiS) a few months ago. They disagreed with the PiS leadership over its campaign for last October’s Polish elections.

The ECR is left with 11 Polish MEPs; seven from the PiS, one independent and three MEPs from the ‘Poland Comes First’ party, which was formed after they had been expelled from the PiS.

The defections will reduce the size of the ECR group from 57 to 53 MEPs. It will remain the Parliament’s fifth largest group after the Greens with 58.

The size of the political groups determines their speaking order in Parliamentary debates.

The EFD group will increase in size to 33 MEPs, one behind the sixth largest group, the European United Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL).